34 posts categorized "Jim Hendry"

November 18, 2008

Wrigleyville resident Ryan Dempster will be able to ride his bike to Wrigley Field through 2012, after agreeing to a four-year, $52 million contract on Tuesday to remain with the Cubs.

Dempster decided to sign before he could really test his value in the free agent market, taking the Cubs offer after talking to teams including Toronto, Atlanta, the Los Angeles Dodgers, the New York Yankees and the New York Mets.

His love of Chicago -- and the Cubs chances of winning a world championship -- factored into the decision, and Dempster didn't want to wait and see if he could make more money elsewhere.

"Given as close as we've been the last two years, I thought, 'This is where I want to be,' " he said. "I enjoy so much playing there.

"Was there more money on the open market? I'm sure there probably was. Who knows if there would've been interest in five years. You never know. That's a question that's never be answered. But personally, I don't even care. I'm happy with what I have, and it's more money than I could ever dream of growing up and playing baseball."

Dempster will receive a $4 million signing bonus, $8 million in 2009, $12.5 million in 2010 and $13.5 million in 2011, with a player option of $14 million for 2012. The deal was consummated relatively quickly because both sides were adamant about Dempster returning.

"It's huge for us," general manager Jim Hendry said. "It was such a priority. Ryan did a terrific job, just a phenomenal season that he had. And as we all know he's as good a clubhouse guy and teammate as we've ever had here. He's a '10' human being, a real leader in the clubhouse.

"It's all about winning. It was imperative we kept him in house. He made no secret that he really wanted to be here."

Hendry added that there were "no doubts in any of our minds that Ryan would've exceeded this deal on the streets three or four weeks from now, the way the market is for starting pitching."

Dempster predicted the Cubs would win the World Series in spring training, but they wound up getting swept by the Dodgers in the Division Series.

Asked about the loss on Tuesday, Dempster suggested the Cubs were not prepared for the postseason, a stunning concept considering they were swept by Arizona only one year earlier.

"I think maybe we underestimated how prepared you have to be, how ready you have to be, especially in a five-game series," Dempster said. "It's like a short heavyweight bout. Ding, the bell is ringing, you've got to go."

The Cubs were knocked out quickly. Dempster also suggested the players were overconfident because of their great home record at Wrigley Field throughout the season.

"It almost felt like it was just going to be a given that we win Games 1 and 2 and move on and go from there," he said. "You've still got to play the games. You've got to put the uniform on and go out there and compete. If anything, we've learned that."

UPDATE: The Cubs and pitcher Ryan Dempster have agreed to a four-year, $52-million extension.

The deal makes Dempster the second-high paid pitcher on the team.

Cubs general manager Jim Hendry will be available for comment Tuesday afternoon.

Dempster also was being courted by Atlanta and Toronto, but returning to the Cubs was his stated priority all along, and teams knew he'd probably stay in Chicago if the price was right. It was.

The veteran right-hander was Hendry's priority this off-season. Now the Cubs GM can turn to the next order of business -- finding a right-fielder who hits left-handed and can fit into the No. 4 or 5 spot in the lineup. He'll also continue to pursue San Diego's Jake Peavy, perhaps giving the Cubs a dream rotation, though there is no imminent closure to that soap opera.

Dempster is on his way back and Cubs fans should be happy.

The relationship between Hendry and Dempster helped smooth the path during negotiations. Hendry took a risk in signing Dempster for $300,000 after 2003, knowing he'd miss most or all of the '04 season after undergoing reconstructive elbow surgery with Cincinnati in August of '03. When Dempster returned to the mound in August of '04, working in middle relief, he said he wanted to play for the Cubs all along.

"There were different offers -- big league jobs, non-big league jobs -- and it worked out great," he said that day. "After the end of the ('03) season with the friction in Cincinnati going on, we were sure Cincy would non-tender me, so we asked if they'd release me so I can start talking to teams. I told my agent right away, 'I love Chicago and want to play for the Cubs.'

"I remember telling Hendry 3-4 years ago I wanted to play for the Cubs. It was one of those things -- they were interested and I'd made up my mind this is where I wanted to come."

Dempster went 1-1 with a 3.92 ERA in 23 appearances in the final two months of '04. Hendry had seen enough and didn't hesitate to pick up the $2 million option for 2005. After starting out the 2005 season in the Cubs rotation, he replaced LaTroy Hawkins as closer and converted 33 of 35 saves, leading the National League with a .943 saves percentage. On the final weekend of the season, Dempster agreed to a three-year, $15.5 million extension, and returned as the closer in '06.

Dempster fell out of favor with a segment of Cubs fans after blowing nine of 33 save opportunities in '06 and going 1-9 with a 4.80 ERA. While he converted 28 of 31 chances in 2007 in his first year under Lou Piniella, Dempster's 2-7 record and 4.73 ERA didn't instill confidence amongst Cubs fans, many of whom wanted him dealt.

Instead, Dempster asked for a return to the rotation in 2008, a request that was granted by Hendry and Piniella. Though he was supposedly vying with Jason Marquis and Jon Lieber in spring training for one of two spots in the rotation, Piniella acknowledged later on in the season that Dempster was slotted in the rotation all along. It turned out to be the right move, as Dempster had a career-best season, going 17-6 with a 2.96 ERA, earning a spot on the NL roster in the All-Star game and being named the Cubs Game 1 starter in the postseason.

That didn't work out so well, as seven walks and James Loney's grand slam led to a Game 1 loss. But Dempster will get a chance to redeem himself in 2009, perhaps as part of a dream rotation if Peavy is acquired.

October 08, 2008

Cubs general manager Jim Hendry said he doesn't know who broke a water pipe in the visitors' dugout after their Game 3 loss to Los Angeles on Saturday.

And to borrow a phrase from outfielder Kosuke Fukudome, he could not care less.

"I have no idea," Hendry said. "And I don't have any interest in finding out. To me, it's not even an issue. Believe me, if I had been in a uniform, it might've been me."

The broken water pipe caused the dugout to flood, and prevented manager Lou Piniella from making his post game press conference in a room down in the left field corner of Dodger Stadium.

It's not uncommon for things to be smashed by the Cubs. Sammy Sosa's boom box was destroyed on the final day of the 2004 season, and this year alone, Carlos Zambrano punched a hole in the wall by his locker, and someone smashed a framed photograph on the clubhouse wall after a loss to Houston in early September.

Hendry said he spoke to the Dodgers after the game and told an official to notify him if there was any damage and that Cubs would pay restitution. He was not at all upset by the idea of someone damaging property after the Cubs were knocked out of the postseason, knowing that professional athletes like to vent differently than a frustrated worker in an office setting.

"The [Dodgers] clubhouse people told me it was about the fourth or fifth time it's happened this year," Hendry said. "I guess the nozzle was knocked off the piping on the wall, and it's probably in a convenient spot when you're leaving the dugout to smack it.

"There was no permanent damage done to the facility, and honestly, major league players won a division and lost the way we played -- three and out -- I certainly would've been disappointed if some people weren't angry at themselves, or angry at the results. The flip side of that, someone would've written if nothing had happened and someone had smiled on the way out, they would've been portrayed as (if) they didn't care about (the loss)."

The Cubs picked up Rich Harden’s $7 million option on Wednesday after an exam showed he does not require shoulder surgery.

If the Cubs hadn't picked up the option, Harden would've been eligible for salary arbitration, but still would've been their property in 2009, no matter how much he made.

General manager Jim Hendry said an MRI-arthrogram on Harden's shoulder revealed no tears of the labrum or rotator cuff, referring to Harden's problems as "subtle instability in the shoulder."

Hendry would've picked up Harden's $7-million option even if the right-hander needed surgery to clean up the shoulder, which probably would've kept him out until May. But he was relieved to hear that no surgery was necessary, despite Harden's history of injuries.

"Obviously Rich has had a long history of some (injury) difficulty, but after the (MRI) arthogram was diagnosed by (team physician Stephen Gryzlo) and the other experts at Northwestern, it was clear the best avenue was not (having) any surgical procedures," Hendry said. "Rich has had, at times obviously, rotator tendinitis, and there's been a longstanding (problems) that every pitcher has in his shoulder. It's no secret that his physical problems in Oakland were tough at times, and we certainly knew that going into his acquisition.

"He made 11 strong starts in Oakland and got up to 25 starts this year, and we are convinced he'll be able to do that at least next year. Obviously in shoulders you have some difficulties in cases like this. There has been some history of subtle instability in his right shoulder. Rich will go about his business in the off-season really preparing to make it stronger and rehab it all winter, and we feel confident he'll be able to go Opening Day."

Harden was 10-2 with a 2.07 ERA in 25 starts for the A's and the Cubs, including 5-1 with a 1.77 ERA in 12 starts in Chicago. Hendry said the Cubs will continue to give Harden some rest next year, with an extra day off here and there.

"Rich Hardens are hard to find," he said. "If you told me today we were going to get 24-25 good starts out of Rich next year and we were going to have to push him back or miss a start or two here or there, I'd do that in a heartbeat."

In other news, Hendry said scouting director Oneri Fleita was in touch with Carlos Marmol on Wednesday, one day after Marmol was injured in a car crash in the Dominican Republic. Marmol told Fleita he was OK, and suffered only a cut on his head.

September 14, 2008

MILWAUKEE -- Ted Lilly will start Monday's game against Houston on his regular rest, facing right-hander Brian Moehler in a 1:05 p.m. start at Miller Park.

Manager Lou Piniella isn't available for comment yet but he and pitching coach Larry Rothschild opted to move Lilly in front of both Jason Marquis and Ryan Dempster in the rotation. The assumption is that he wanted to use right-handers Dempster, Rich Harden and Marquis against the predominantly right-handed hitting Brewers in the three-game series at Wrigley Field from Tuesday-Thursday.

Despite using the home clubhouse of the Brewers, the Cubs are obviously the visitors in tonight's game, which will be televised locally on WGN-Ch. 9, (but not on the Superstation for out-of-area viewers with Ch. 9 on their cable system). Houston figured that it would help its comfort factor by taking the visitors clubhouse at Miller Park.

The Edens Expressway was open again today and it was a relatively smooth trip up to Miller Park, only 90 minutes from Irving Park and the Kennedy to the ballpark. The ramp in downtown Milwaukee to goes west on I-94 to Madison is finally open, so road-tripping CUbs fans wont have to take that long, circuitous detour that sent them eat to the lakeshore before going back west to Miller Park.

The ballpark is practically empty, except for employees who watched the end of the Packers-Lions game in the Friday's restaurant in left field. We'll provide you with updates as the day goes on.

July 27, 2008

The Cubs are expected to be fined $500,000 by Major League Baseball this week for violating the rules of the amateur draft.

While the issue hasn't been fully resolved, the Cubs have not denied any rules violations. The club is hoping for leniency based on their clean record up to this incident.

"We've never violated the rules in the past," general manager Jim Hendry said. "Clearly we violated the rules of not reporting (two) signings before they were completed."

The two draft picks received "over-the-slot" signing bonuses, meaning they got more money than the MLB guidelines suggest for picks in their respective rounds of the draft.

But the team says the violation was procedural, not financial, and the Cubs know they will have to pay some penalty for the delay in reporting the signings to the league. The question is how much the penalty should be.

Hendry said the Cubs' mistake in reporting the signings was unintentional. He's enjoyed a good relationship with Commissioner Bud Selig, which could bode well for the Cubs. But MLB is a stickler for following procedural rules regarding the draft, so it may not matter in the long run.

May 07, 2008

CINCINNATI -- Scott Eyre will throw tonight in Tennesse in his final rehab outing in the minors, then report to the Cubs in time to be activated before Saturday's game against the Diamondbacks at Wrigley Field.

General manager Jim Hendry said the Cubs won't go with 13 pitchers when Eyre returns, as Lou Piniella talked about previously, so one of the relievers will have to go down to Triple-A Iowa.

Sean Gallagher may be the odd man out because he's the least experienced reliever and the Cubs still consider him a starter in the making. But Piniella hasn't shown much faith in Michael Wuertz of late, so we'll have to see what happens.

Asked about Piniella's statement on Tuesday that changes may be afoot, Hendry simply said that Piniella will play the guys that deserve to play. That could mean more playing time for Ronny Cedeno, perhaps at the expense of the struggling Mark DeRosa.

"All along we've had the kind of guys on the bench that could play, and I think Lou is doing what he always does and will continue to do, and that's to continue to use the people that are playing well," Hendry said. "We'll mix and match, and guys that are getting some playing time that deserve it (will play). Ronny is probably playing more than he expected out of camp, and deservedly so, and (Mike) Fontenot has come back and played quite a bit."

Alfonso Soriano is getting the day off against Reds rookie Edinson Volquez, which means Reed Johnson is in left and leading off. Cedeno is back at second in place of DeRosa and batting seventh, and Felix Pie is back in center and batting eighth. All the other usual suspects are in their usual spots.

Hendry said the wrist injury to Aramis Ramirez hurt the Cubs because DeRosa was forced to fill in at third when he probably should've rested. DeRosa committed a big error at third in Monday's 5-3 loss and went 0-for-3 with three strikeouts.

"DeRo was really on fumes and needed a day," Hendry said. "And unfortunately we got it to him a day later than we would've liked, because he was really out of gas."

The sun has come out after an overcast morning with Jon Lieber making his first start as a Cub this season. Lieber was wearing one of his favorites T-shirts before the game -- a cartoon of a Smiley face with a bullet hole in it, and blood smatterings in the back.

April 16, 2008

Had another lineup fantasy last night on the heels of Alfonso Soriano's hop-related calf injury (and nearing trip to the 15-day DL). And this one was rated XXX.

In my dream, Kosuke Fukudome moves into the leadoff spot and plays centerfield, with Reed Johnson hitting second and playing left. Derrek Lee and Aramis Ramirez follow, with Mike Fontenot in the 5-hole at second, Mark DeRosa in right batting sixth, Geovany Soto catching at seven and Ryan Theriot batting eighth.

This gives the Cubs speed in the 1, 2 and 8 spots, and gives Felix Pie a chance to get his head together on the bench after last night's three-strikeout performance.

After waking up, I realized it was just a figment of my imagination and I had not actually speed-dialed Lou Piniella. (He's not even programmed into my cell).

But the question remains:

What will the Cubs do today after Soriano officially goes on the disabled list for the most creative Cubs injury since Mike Remlinger got his pinky stuck between two recliners while lounging in the Remlinger-zone?

The possibilities are endless.

It appears that the obvious choice to replace Soriano -- Matt Murton -- isn't the one on Jim Hendry's radar. That suggests the Cubs believe DeRosa and Reed Johnson can handle left, Mike Fontenot can step in everyday at second, making Ronny Cedeno available against left-handers.

In that likelihood, the Cubs would call up an infield prospect to come off the bench, perhaps Eric Patterson, a second baseman who can play center in a pinch. That would make for an emotional reunion of the Patterson brothers tonight at Wrigley, which would only be appropriate.

Booing Corey and cheering Eric in the very same inning? What a beautiful world Cubs fans live in.

DeRosa had a little trouble in left, playing there for the first time in a year and with a 20 m.p.h. wind blowing out.

"I don't know why it's so different from right, but it played a little different," DeRosa said.

Still, DeRosa made a nice running catch and is considered an adequate outfielder, albeit without much range. He's probably better off in right, but that would necessitate a switch of Fukudome to center, leaving Pie as the late-inning defensive replacement.

Either way, DeRosa's ability to serve as the team chameleon and play anywhere is once again in the spotlight. Many Cubs fans were angered at the possibility of DeRosa losing his second base job to Brian Roberts, but this super-utility role is the one the Cubs envisioned for him when they sought out Roberts.

The winds are supposed to be even stronger for tonight's 7:05 start, and that should make things even more interesting in the match-up of Carlos Zambrano and Josh Fogg. Right-handed hitters are batting .300 against Fogg, and Derrek Lee is swinging the bat better than any time since his wrist injury in '06.

Zambrano should be primed after his sub-par outing last Friday in Philly and his pitching coach's subsequent admission that Big Z hasn't completely kicked the caffeine habit just yet.

March 26, 2008

That's the word from Lou Piniella at Cubs camp Wednesday as Cubs players packed their belongings onto the equipment truck to be shipped back to Chicago for the regular season.

Cintron, who received a non-roster invitation to camp, was hampered this spring by a freak injury in which he was hit in the face by a foul ball off the bat of Mark DeRosa. No sooner did he return to action when he was sidelined with a sore hamstring.

Cintron hit .316 in 38 at-bats and played well defensively, but was the victim of a numbers game. His locker was cleared out on Wednesday morning and he was not in camp after being released.

Cedeno hit .308 this spring and earned a chance to return as the back-up to Ryan Theriot at short. The experiment to try Cedeno in center didn't go well and he only got a couple of appearances out in the outfield. Nevertheless, Cedeno was out of options and had to either make the club or be put on waivers, where some team no doubt would've claimed him.

Cedeno said Wednesday he was told that he'd made the club.

That leaves the last spot for Mike Fontenot as the Cubs decided to go with an extra infielder over an extra outfielder. The Cubs will bring five outfielders to Chicago, including two reserves in Daryle Ward and Reed Johnson.

It was a tough decision for Jim Hendry and Lou Piniella, since both Fontenot (who hit .255 this spring) and Murton (who hit .345) made contributions to last year's division-winning team.

March 24, 2008

MESA, Ariz. -- General manager Jim Hendry said Monday he isn't worried about Mark DeRosa's hurt feelings over having a potential Brian Roberts trade hanging over his head the past 3½ months.

DeRosa told the Tribune last Friday: "I feel like I've done enough the last two years where I shouldn't be put in this position. But it is what it is, so I'm not going to worry about it. Hopefully Jim and Lou (Piniella) realize that I'm one of the best hitting position players they've got, and my bat should be in the lineup."

There's been no real movement on the Roberts talks, but many expect it to come down before the end of spring training on Saturday.

"I've talked to Mark two or three times in camp," Hendry said. "We can't help it if I don't talk to somebody for a week and it gets written about every day. I think he knows where I'm coming from. I'm always upfront with the players. At the same time, I've made no secret to you, him or anybody in public that if we start with Mark DeRosa at second base, I'm thrilled with it.

"All we really need before Opening Day is one more guy that can help us out in the outfield, and especially a guy that can play center, we're going to do that. I put that on myself a while back."

Hendry still expects to bring in a reserve outfielder by the end of the week, but couldn't predict when it would get done.

"The other trades that are bantered around, you really can't control the other half of the equation," he said. "I feel bad for Mark, but we're all tired of reading about it, and he knows from my perspective that it was never a reflection on him."